Comes with their own cooling fans

There have only been a few RAM kits we can recall that came with cooling fans, or that were recommended to pair with an active cooling scheme. Of course, those were back in the early days of DDR memory, when buying a kit of overclocking RAM could you make late with your mortgage payment that month. In any event, much as changed since then, though apparently we haven't seen the last of RAM and fan combinations -- G.Skill's new Ripjaws 4 DDR4 3200MHz and 3400MHz memory kits both with active cooling add-ons.

Get ready to see 12.5-inch 2-in-1 PCs in the near future

If you own a low-cost 2-in-1 hybrid device (or convertible laptop, if you prefer to call it that), chances are you're rocking a 10-inch display, or thereabouts. Going forward, don't be surprised to see vendors start churning out bigger size models. That's because Intel has reportedly expanded its 2-in-1 reference blueprint to now include 12.5-inch display products, paving the way for larger 2-in-1 models.

The mainframe is dead, long live the mainframe

For IBM, there is no debating whether or not the mainframe is dead. If IBM felt it was, the company wouldn't have gambled $1 billion, five years of development, over 500 new patents, and collaborative efforts with more than 60 clients in the z13, IBM's newest mainframe and, according to Big Blue, one of the most sophisticated computer systems ever built -- high self praise.

Market research firm notes quiet and steady growth in PC sector

Ever since the first iPad came out, we had to hear analysts and market research firms predict a future in which we'd all ditch our traditional PCs for slates. Once again, however, time is the ultimate judge, and now that tablets are seemingly everywhere, consumers are turning their attention back to PCs, Gartner says. As such, Gartner notes a 1 percent increase in worldwide PC shipments in the fourth quarter of 2014, which translates into 83.7 million units.

Low cost device represents a significant mobile play

Entry level handsets launched in emerging markets don't typically elicit too much attention, though in this case, there's a reason why some people are making a big deal out of Samsung's latest smartphone. The Samsung Z1, launched today in New Delhi, runs the company's own Tizen operating system, which is indicative of Samsung wanting to groom new users and markets on something other than Android.

A different kind of streaming box

In the old days, PC gamers would sit in front of a large CRT monitor in a dedicated room littered with spare parts, game boxes (yes, there was actually a time when PC games came in big retail boxes!), empty potato chip bags, and other things scattered all around. Not anymore. Vendors are starting to recognize that PC gamers are mobile creatures, and so we're seeing more streaming options. While at the Consumer Electronics Show last week, NZXT showed us a PC streaming device of its own called DOKO.

CyberPower Trinity PC, tiny PC on an HDMI stick, and more

While CES 2015 was more of an evolutionary year as opposed to a revolutionary one, there were some interesting devices in the PC space. If you’ve read our CES 2015 prediction piece, nearly all of that came true. We saw a bunch of VR headsets, assisted driving cars, and more. We’ve highlighted our favorite hardware from the show below.

Did you have a favorite piece of hardware from CES this year? Let us know in the comments below!

Score a point in favor of the home brewed PC

You don't have to sell us on the merits of building a PC from scratch -- it's what we've been doing for decades, and it's one of the core principles of our brand. Heck, the desire to roll your own rig may have even been what prompted you to pick up your very first issue of Maximum PC (or Boot). Well, we're embarking on a new year, and already there's evidence that this passion of ours is yet again in great shape -- the numbers are in from Asus, which shipped 5.6 million DIY motherboards in the fourth quarter of 2014 alone.

The need for speed

Now that Haswell-E and accompanying Intel X99-based motherboards requiring DDR4 RAM are here, we expect to see a lot of record announcements. It always happens when new platforms are introduced, and G.Skill is wasting no time adding to its virtual shelf of overclocking tropies -- G.Skill today announced that it set a new memory record for fastest DDR4 memory frequency at 4,255MHz.

One of the biggest developments in the solid state drive market has been that of falling prices over the past couple of years. We hope that trend continues, though it's not the sole storyline -- there's also the transition to PCI Express, and with it comes much faster speeds than their SATA 6Gbps counterparts. How fast are we talking? Well, Samsung's SM951 SSD for ultra-slim laptops and workstations is rated to read and write data at up to 2,150MB/s, and 1,550MB/s, respectively.